The GOP's First Volley in 2004 Elections

Graham Calls Bush Speech

"The GOP's First Volley in 2004 Elections"

Senator Bob Graham, D-Florida, said Tuesday night that President Bush used his State of the Union speech as "the Republicans' first volley for the 2004 presidential election."

Graham said Bush "spent most of his time on foreign policy and national security issues, and domestic policy was at the end…. That indicated the president is planning to run on his national security record - which is a perfectly legitimate strategy - but there certainly are clear differences in the ways in which he has managed our global interests and what the Democrats would do."

Noting that Bush did not mention the mastermind of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, who remains on the loose, Graham said: "If I was the president, I wouldn't mention Osama bin Laden either."

Graham said, "There are some issues where the president deserves to receive recognition," including the capture of Saddam Hussein in Iraq. "But we have paid a heavy price for those, including a rupture with some of our strongest international allies… and taking our focus off al Qaeda, which makes a real threat still to Americans.

"Those are tradeoffs which the president has made, and I expect that the president will pay a price. Yes, everyone is happy that we captured Saddam Hussein and ended his reign in Iraq. But everyone is sad at the high costs we have paid in the war, especially in American lives, and we haven't crushed al Qaeda and captured Osama bin Laden."

On the President's brief references to expanding health care tax credits, Graham said, "Of course, the devil will be in the details. When it comes to health care, I believe our focus should be on three very vulnerable groups: children, the working poor and early retirees. I didn't hear him say what he is going to do to help any of those three groups, who pay little or no income tax.

"In terms of economics, yes, the stock market has had an upward move and the last quarter showed an increase in economic growth. But we still aren't seeing growth in jobs. And we are running deficits of $500 billion a year…. If you spend more money than you take in, you can live high on the hog for a while, but then you've got to pay off those deficits."